busy
Because of wanting to post my pics from the LBJ Presidential Library and Museum yesterday, I didn't blog about it being the 129th anniversary of the shooting of President James Garfield, so I'll do it today. Garfield was the second President to be assassinated in office (Lincoln of course was the first.) Poor President Garfield was only four months into his term when he was shot by Julius Guiteau on July 2, 1881. Like William McKinley two decades later, he survived for a period of time after being shot, and also like McKinley, there is speculation that medical malpractice (or at least a lack of medical diligence) played a part in his death.
Garfield was shot by Charles Julius Guiteau on July 2, 1881 at 9:30 a.m. He was walking through the Sixth Street Station of the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad (a predecessor of the Pennsylvania Railroad) in Washington, D.C., on his way to a college reunion. He was accompanied by Secretary of State James G. Blaine and his sons, James and Harry. Two bullets struck him, but the wounds ought not have been fatal, even by the medical standards of the day. One bullet grazed his arm, but a second bullet lodged in his back and could not be found. Alexander Graham Bell devised a metal detector in an attempt to find the bullet, but the metal bed-frame Garfield was lying on made the instrument malfunction. Because metal bed-frames were relatively rare, the cause of the instrument's deviation was unknown at the time.
When he was arrested after the shooting, Guiteau said, "I am a Stalwart of the Stalwarts! I did it and I want to be arrested! Arthur is President now!" The Stalwarts were those who believed in political patronage, something that Garfield had promised to rid the nation of. This briefly led to unfounded suspicions that incoming President Chester Alan Arthur or his supporters had put Guiteau up to the crime. Arthur had been chosen to run on the ticket with Garfield for political advantage, to placate his faction of Stalwarts, rather than for skills or loyalty to his running-mate. Guiteau was upset because he was repeatedly rejected in his application to be appointed as the U.S. Consul in Paris, a position for which he had absolutely no qualifications. His being crazy was also seen as an impediment to the job.
Garfield became increasingly ill due to infection, which caused his heart to weaken. 80 days after being shot, Garfield died of a massive heart attack or a ruptured splenic artery aneurysm, following blood poisoning and bronchial pneumonia. He died 10:35 p.m. on Monday September 19, 1881 in Elberon, New Jersey, exactly two months before his 50th birthday. The ailing President had been moved to Elberon, a seaside community, in the vain hope that the fresh air and quiet there might aid his recovery.
Many historians and medical experts now believe that Garfield probably would have survived his wound had the doctors attending him been more capable. Several inserted their unsterilized fingers into the wound to probe for the bullet, and one doctor punctured Garfield's liver in such an attempt.
Guiteau was found guilty of assassinating Garfield, despite his lawyers raising an insanity defense. He insisted that incompetent medical care had really killed the President. Although historians generally agree that was a contributing factor, it did not amount to a legal defense. Guiteau was sentenced to death, and was executed by hanging on June 30, 1882 in Washington, D.C.
The irony was that Garfield was the lilly-white purist on the ticket and was supposed to clean up the corruption in Washington. Yet it was Arthur, the supposed product of the political bosses, who later passed civil service reform legislation. Guiteau's plan backfired. Garfield's assassination was instrumental in leading to the passage of the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act on January 16, 1883. No, Chet didn't have a religious experience, he was just a pragmatist who realized which way the political winds were blowing and donned the sheep's clothing of a reformer to gain political brownie points.
